two too tarred to tango

Of course this post has nothing to do with tango-ing and everything to do with being tired. The ( exterior of the ) barn will be finished by the end of the week. Right now it lacks trim, gutters, and oh yeah, a ROOF. And doors. Meanwhile the old barn demolishing goes on and on, since it seems to take us just as long to take the barn apart (so that we can re-use a fair amount of the lumber, to save $$) as it did to initially raise it. Except then, we were 20+ years younger. And I feel it in every aching joint. Never thought I'd miss my knees so much.

As a result of no roof, it has been necessary to move the hay yet again to get it under cover. I'm on a first name basis with some of it ("Hay there, you're looking a little tattered and pale, bale"). I feel guilty as hell for leaving the horses with no shelter during these daily downpours and thunderstorms, even though it's warm and the storms blow over in 15 minutes. I'm sure we will never get all the overlapping parts done, like: run the water and drain lines, then pour the concrete, THEN get a plumber to hook everything up, after we find a sink cabinet for the old sink, but the concrete will need to be painted in the tack room where the sink goes first, and the stalls can't be assembled until the floor mats are down, but first the stall floors have to be covered in crushed stone, and then tamped with a tamper which we will have to rent, after we get the crushed stone delivered and moved inside the barn after we rent a skidder, and after the floor mats are on, they have to be covered in coarse sand, which will also have to be ordered and spread, and before the horses can go in the stalls, we need to put wood shaving bedding in, which will have to be delivered, once the spot for it is concreted and a low cinder wall on three sides built. And a cover for it fabricated. And the tack room will have to be built so I can get all the tack out of the self-storage place (more $$) and don't even get me started with the electrical wiring, which must be done by a genuine electrician and inspected before the power company will run the line to the barn, once they put in a new pole. Madness, all of it, and at night I go over and over it all in my mind, trying to get it all straight chronologically. That's what the burning smell is. Fried brain.

And we get filthy on a daily basis, which means more dirty clothes, and towels, and who has time for laundry?

And we pick up the new puppy this weekend.

Anyway, that's my rant for today.

In a different vein, I have finished the Harry Potter book and found it quite satisfactory. I have a novel partly finished, and as the plot unfolds, if I need to put some twist in earlier, I go back and edit the earlier chapter. So I am in awe that J.K. Rowling figured the entire **series** out, covering 6 years and more, before book one was printed and thus beyond editing, so the continuity of the plot would be uncompromised. But you know what part made me cry? >>>>>>>>> Spoiler alert <<<<<<<<<<







It's when, all alone in the Forbidden Forest, all the battle done and friends lost, Harry held the Snitch to his lips and whispered, "I am about to die." This resonated with me in a way I couldn't have expected, and which moves me still. Because I too faced self-selected death, twice, all alone and lost in my pain. I didn't succeed, and have overcome some or most of my pain. And I am here and thus can lose myself in Hogwarts and Harry, and enjoy more and more of life. Touch wood.

Lesson Four

Here is the last lesson in the course, the topic was "light". The first is of Maybe (sis) and Willie (bro) in a rare moment of accord. In the next shot, she was bitting him.















This is a photo taken of a stained glass window in a local Morgantown house, built by W.E. Price in 1902. It is by Tiffany. I took this from the inside in the afternoon.
























I had a better shot compositionally, but the window itself was burned out. (Need a better camera, hint hint). Still this Sony Cybershot doesn't do badly for a point-and-shoot.

Lesson three

Here are the two photos I submitted for photo class lesson three, on "Framing". We were told to park the car, walk 100 steps, and take 6 photos without moving more than 5-6 steps. I went to Dorsey Knob overlook, parked and walked about 200 steps straight uphill; but it was only 100 steps going down (lol). Then I took one shot on the way out. They've been tidied in Photoshop a little to remove phone poles and a water tower. I think these two turned out well. And oh, the leafy green vine growing up so photogenically on the tree in the bottom one? Poison ivy.

In other news, the new barn is underway. Have you ever found, when you are talking to the lead man on any given project, that he explains everything, describes all the special details they take care of, etc. You think "wow I got a sharp outfit for this". This illusion lasts until the work crew shows up, and if you are so unwise as to watch them, they basically slop the thing together and split for the day. And you think, wait a minute, weren't they supposed to...? I am determined to not watch anymore. When the thing is all done, and before we sign off on the job, I'm going to go over the thing with a fine toothed comb and have them fix all those "details" before they get the final check. What do I care if they think I'm being a bit**? It's not like we'll ever see them again.

We pick up the new Newfoundland black and white puppy on Aug 4th in Ohio. Hopefully I won't break my ankle while this one is settling in and she'll bond to me instead of DH. I tried taking Raven to obedience class, but she just basically dragged me around and ignored me, so last week DH took her. The instructors actively promote the use of a "gentle leader", that's a collar that goes across the muzzle and high on the neck, the theory being that if you control the head, the body will follow. But you know what? It doesn't work all that well on big strong dogs, and we have returned to the chain collar. That is what we have used on our dogs for the last 35 years, and none of them suffered any Post Traumatic Stress, so I guess it wasn't that "cruel" but it did certainly prevent them from dragging you across the floor, on account of needing to breathe. So if it Ain't broke, don't Fix it. Oh yeah, and the "gentle leader" costs 4X what a chain collar does.

A wee bit Late

Happy Fourth of July!

This is a photo I took for the photo course lesson two, which was about "shapes". Nice for the Fourth, yes?

Puppy Update

The "puppy" will be 6 months old this week. Here are two photos of her getting some aquatic exercise.







This is easy exercise time for us, as she gets pooped pretty quickly and will take a nap as soon as we dry her off. Of course, the pool filter gets a little hairy. And you'd think she would smell better, but no. Her coat is so dense and oily that she isn't even completely wet when she is done swimming. Kinda like a duck, only bigger! Around 75 pounds. now.

And we pick up puppy #2 the first of August (what was I thinking??)

Summer nearly over

When I was a kid, to me, "summer" lasted from the day school was over to when school started again in September. So I can remember being puzzled when my grandmother would sigh and say, "Fourth of July already. Summer is nearly over." I'd think, What??? How silly! But in the fullness of time, I understand; it seems like it is the fourth, then Wham! it's Labor Day, time to cover the pool and rake leaves. Of course, *I* don't have grandchildren to impress with my wisdom. Phooey.

We are building a new barn for the horses. Our once-charming wooden barn, which we built ourselves with the help of friends and neighbors some 20+ years ago, now looks like a derelict slum-barn. Wood is weathered, chewed, or patched. Roof is bad, those adorable Dutch doors hang all crooked (because the horses beat on them when they are bored) and the entire thing is too small. So, we will soon have a 36' x 40' metal post building, pre-fab stalls with *sliding* doors and grillwork all around, and a heated tack room and workshop. Plus a much enlarged hay storage area, which will make for a smoother winter at the least. But it is very complicated. One guy to do the site prep and gravel the road to the barn (behind the house rather than beside, which will certainly thrill the neighbors across the road), the power company to install a new line and pole to the barn (for which we had to cut down 5 scraggly trees), an electrician for the wiring, a plumber for the water, a paving company to pour the cement in part of the barn, getting the stalls assembled (maybe we can do that), and at the very end, dismantling the old barn and hauling it away. We'll reuse some of the wood in it, but so much of it is horse-chewed, it can only be used if the bad parts are cut out. We are going to be busy. Besides cutting down the trees (and getting poison ivy, ick!), we rehung several gates and moved the fencing to accomodate them. The barn guy said, did we think he could get a tractor-trailer in there? We looked at each other and in one voice said "NO". Tiny little one lane road with a sharp bend has defeated many a modular home trying to squeeze past. You have only to look at the creases in the phone pole at the bend to believe.

Oh yeah, we also must assemble a storage shed for the mowers, etc. outside the fence.

On another topic, the on-line photo class has been fun so far. The first assignment involved making something inanimate appear alive. Here is the photo I submitted









and also this one








Both of them are of an alabaster statuette about 10 inches tall. Most of the light was supplied by flashlights.

Memorial Day

Well, I'm a few days late, but anyway...

We went put to flowers on the four graves in Braxton County the weekend before Memorial Day, and while we were there, we went out to the old farmhouse. I'm amazed it is still standing, it isn't safe to even enter now. Here is the "now" photo














and here is a photo taken in 1904 when the house had just been completed. The husband and wife are my greatgrandparents, and the tall boy is my grandfather.




It gives me a chill, to see how heavy the hand of Time has been, not only on the farmhouse, but on the family. Only two left of my mom's generation; the eight cousins of my generation, seven living since my sister died, mostly never see each other, except at funerals.

I'm feeling really blue tonight, I have other things to write, but not tonight.

Update

I feel really old right now. Bad enough that I broke my ankle 10 weeks ago, but around 4 weeks ago I messed up my knee trying to manouver my cam boot and foot into the car when the car parked next to us made fully opening my door impossible. Yesterday I went to the ortho doc who checked my knee, and found arthritic changes. He gave me a cortisone and novocaine shot behind the knee, and it actually feels pretty good now. At least I haven't had to go to bed at night with an ice pack strapped to my knee. However, last night my right elbow began an aching/numbing thingy, I guess I must resign myself to slowly falling apart, one joint at a time.

The hub was been bitten by the golf bug recently when he worked at a charity golf tournament. I tried to get him interested in golf 30+ years ago when we lived in San Fran, and got him a gift certificate for lessons, but for whatever reason it didn't ring his bell then. I think he'll enjoy it now that he has time to spare. I, personally, would rather watch grass grow, but to each his own.

I think #1 son has actually gotten a job, full time with benefits, yeah!! It isn't the greatest pay in the world, but at least he's not flipping burgers. I thought, when he was in school, that with a degree in geology a job would be pretty easy to find, but no. There were as many as 300 applicants for one entry-level position he applied for, and although he got an interview, of course they picked someone with 10 years of experience. You hear all the time about the jobless rate falling, but my guess is that most of them are in the "service" area (burger flipping, et al.) and not in professional jobs, where I suppose a lot of the jobs are now outsourced to India or wherever. Both son and daughter can at least still live at home, because for sure you can't support yourself around here for $8 / hour.

I've been doing some knitting, and it hasn't helped with the joint problems, let me tell you. Plus, I think I would do much better if I could actually see; at no position in the graduated bifocals are my hands in focus. Sigh. I think it's ironic that now that I have the time to do leisurely hobbies, I lack the physical wherewithall to do them. If I want to feel like a total blob I'll have to try riding again, that will certainly send a message to my bones that Elvis has left the building.

It's a short trip...

The Newfoundland puppy is driving me crazy. Her latest thing is the swimming pool. We fully intend letting her swim, because she clearly enjoys water...a lot. But our pool isn't open yet; we typically open it around Memorial Day. So right now it has the winter cover on it, replete with puddled water and leaf debris. We have a deck all the way around it, and several days ago Raven launched herself off the deck and into the icky water on the cover. The cover is not intended to support a cavorting dog weighing 50 pounds (at 17 weeks), and if she were to go through the cover she would surely drown before we could tear the cover off, and find her in the mucky water. So we stretched that orange "warning" plastic fencing across the deck to block the pool, but still allow her to go from the back porch out to the fenced yard. The orange fencing is also upheld by two sawhorses, besides being attached to the deck railing. So what did she do? She just launched herself at the fence and trampled it underfoot, then plunged once again into the pool. The barrier lasted about 2 hours. And then she is not only wet, but smells like The Swamp Thing. Again. So this weekend the plan is to add to the deck railing by building an extension all the way across the deck blocking the pool, with a gate. It will be made of wood to match the rest of the railing, and it will be a nuisance because it will cross the area where we hang the hammock, meaning it must be moved too.

The cats are really bent out of shape too, even though Raven just wants to play. If she catches one of them unaware, she polishes them with a big ole lick and lots of dog spit. It has been an ongoing challenge to put their dry food where they can go and she can't; worst of all are the water bowls, since Raven pretty much inhales all the water she can reach. One of the cats (I'm not certain which, although I have my suspicions) showed her extreme displeasure by peeing on the dining table!!!!! At the time, one of the cameras was on it, and it got christened too, which is how I found about it. And we wanted pets for what??

I have signed up for an on-line photography course starting June 6th. It is a composition class, and the students upload their photos for the instructor and the other enrolled students to critique. There are 4 lessons in all, and 11 days to complete each one. I now have a decent digital camera (a Sony Cybershot), and I'm looking forward to doing this. I'll share the assignments and maybe my photos here as i go. My daughter wants to take a beginning photo class, and checked with the local Vo-Tech and the journalism dept at WVU, but both of them have discarded their black-and-white darkroom work and changed to digital only. Most digital cameras cannot be used in a manual mode that allows you to control BOTH aperature and exposure, and even then focus is auto. This means basically, that if you want a very shallow depth-of-field, where your subject is in focus but everything behind is not, you pretty much can't do it unless the background is *very* distant indeed. And trying to take a panning shot of an object in motion is impossible, as it drives the autofocus nuts. It will all be blurry, instead of a sharp subject against a streaked background. And I don't know how you can gain an understanding of f-stop and depth-of-field when you can't control the aperature at all. Sigh. This is another instance where the old was better than the new, and where technology takes the place of actually knowing what you're doing.

Battery power low, must close! Photo soon.

Podunk praise

Life in a small town is much different than living in a big city. I grew up in Miami, lived in Memphis and then San Francisco before moving to this small WV town, and it took me a while to get used to the different way people behave. I remember one time, I had gone to the grocery store in our pickup truck, and because the seat was pretty much filled with a baby seat and baby, I put the groceries in the back. As soon as I turned the corner, all the groceries fell over and began slidding all over. I pulled to side of the road, climbed into the bed of the truck, and to my vast surprise, someone stopped and asked if I needed help! Several people called out "You OK?" as they slowed going past me. In San Fran, you could be bleeding to death, lying in the middle of the road, and people would swerve to go around you, that's how unlikely it was that you would get any help. People here hold doors, wave you into traffic, help you load your groceries in your car and refuse a tip if you offer. Amazing.

But the more subtle result of living in a town is that people are no longer anonymous, and this can be a good thing, and a bad thing too. I would tell a funny story about something the babysitter said, everyone would chuckle, and then someone would ask, Who's your sitter? And I would answer, and inevitably someone would remark, I went to school with her, or, my brother is good friends with her brother, and I'd gulp and try to remember if I'd said anything hurtful. The connections seemed to be a network that encompassed everyone. You couldn't be rude when you were driving, cut someone off, flip the bird, because when you got to the grocery store, there they were, your checker. Who clearly remembered the incident. We've lived here 25+years, and although the population is 25,000, less the students, still everyone now looks vaguely familiar, but you can't recall in what context. Was it Girl Scouts? 4-H? High school band? When my kids were learning to drive, we forbid them from taking anyone else in their car. I think it is a huge distraction to an inexperienced driver, and I couldn't imagine how I could face the parents if some child were hurt in a car mine were driving. And I pointed out to them, that everyone here knows everyone, and if they gave a ride to anyone, I WOULD hear about it, make no mistake. And it worked very well, I might add.

But I guess the down side is that it is all to easy to know the private things too. Like when I went to the Psych hospital after a failed suicide attempt, the clerk that admitted me was a former co-worker. Her husband taught my kids at the junior high school. We both belonged to the local kennel club. N knows hundreds of people from work, and would run into them everytime we went to the mall, usually when we were having a little dispute about what to buy. In San Fran, I NEVER saw anyone outside of work unless it was a planned event, never at any mall, theater, hairdresser, park, anywhere at all. It was so different here, I felt intimidated about the books I got out of the library, the videos we rented, the bar we went to, everything. Everytime I came home with fast food, I felt like the neighbors were saying, Doesn't that woman ever cook? They even published (then) the names of patients admitted or released from the local hospital in the local newspaper. They still publish the daily police report, so you can see that, yes, your boss WAS arrested for DUI. So I can understand why people find small town life too stifling, too much like living in a fishbowl. Still in all, I'd rather be here than the greatest city in the world. When my friend from Miami visited me a few years ago, we went to the mall, and at one point sat on a bench. She said, Look where your purse is, then look where mine is. And sure enough, hers was on the bench between us, still looped over her shoulder and with one hand on it. Mine was on the floor near my feet. She said, That's the difference in living in big city. And I guess she is right.

Has it been that long?

While I was still working I thought that once I was retired I'd have time to post all sorts of things. But in reality I am posting less often. I have been told that it takes a full year to get used to retirement, that in the first few months you feel like you are on an extended vacation, and then you get caught up in all the things to do in/on the house now that you are there to see what needs to be done all day every day. And all that is true, I think. But I found that a broken ankle that keeps you from doing anything in the house, or going out, or doing much if you ARE out, mainly leaves me feeling so depressed I could barely get out of bed. Many days I never got dressed, brushed my teeth, or combed my hair. All I could tell myself was "this won't last" like a mantra.

And it didn't. Today the doctor told me I could forego the walking boot and launch out in actual shoes. This means I can DRIVE! I haven't been so excited about getting behind the wheel since I got my license at 16. Freedom! So the depression may get bad again, but I will tell myself "this won't last" once again.

And I'll try to post more often, if only to have a place to air my thoughts, such as they are. And if people read it and think "boring" It doesn't matter; it's not like I'm delivering a paid product, after all.

Hooray!!

The cast is OFF! Went to my new ortho doctor, who x-rayed and decreed that my ankle was OK to go into a (removable) walking boot. I can take it off to shower, to sleep, even to hobble gingerly to the bathroom. I feel like dancing..err..not quite. But soon...

Oh yes, and Raven is also out of her splint and only limped a bit for a few days afterward. Now she is back to harassing the cats, who had gotten used to her limited mobility and now have to hustle to get out of reach. She is now 15 weeks old and weighs 35 pounds. She MUST learn to go down stairs, even muscular son is having difficulty carrying her when she needs to go out.

I am avoiding all TV news because I cannot bear all the post-tragedy rhetoric about Virginia Tech. The horror of what went on, especially for the survivors, makes me feel physically ill. Just writing this much makes me feel ill.

Yesterday was the husband's birthday. He always has a mixed attitude about it. On one hand he wants us to make a fuss about him, and on the other he doesn't want to acknowledge that he is, well, (whisper) older. How can we win at this? Make him a birthday cake and then pretend it's for no special reason? We went out to dinner (first time since I broke my ankle) which was very yummy. I gave him a WW II photo of the flying tigers, autographed by the commander, which I ordered online. A fun time was had by all.

New depression med is perhaps helping with the persistent depression. I ardently hope that the other meds are not losing their efficationess. If that's a real word. Going off one anti-depressant and onto another has in the past sent me into a total meltdown, and I'm running out of classes of drugs to try. I wish I could take my brain out and give it a good scrubdown and then reboot.

This is certainly an uninspired post, I think I'll just give up now....bye!

Those were the days, my friend

I noticed today, not for the first time, that I am definitely getting old. In some ways, on the inside, I still feel like I am 18; I still feel awkward and gauche in social settings, un-informed about current events, certain that everyone else is better than me at cooking and housekeeping, that my kids are lazy and self-centered, and I'm a lousy driver. But yet as I look around me, I can see that, like the lyric in 'Strawberry Wine' there is nothing that Time hasn't touched. I think of my Lotsa dog, and with a jolt I realize that the puppy times for her were more than 20 years in the past. I think about heart-ties to pets that no one but me and N remember. I think about friends that came and went in my life, some moving away, and some passing on. Family traditions that have vanished because there is no one left to do them. Places like playgrounds and parks that are no more. They're tearing down my old high school this year, a school that was 'state-of-the-art', and building a new one just in time for my 40th reunion. Physical things, old photos that have faded to illegibility, dried corsages that are ribbon and dust, a quilt that is nearly transparent from use, even prosaic things like my rolling pin, a gift on our wedding day from my to-be father-in-law, that got crammed in a drawer once too often. Who expects to wear out a rolling pin? And like my mother did in her day, I find many new things to be unsatisfactory; much cheaper in price, but poorly made, solid old brick buildings replaced by new cracker boxes with paper thin walls, lovely big trees cut down between one day and the next to make room for more parking spaces. I always thought that I was someone who embraced change, like when the music of the 60s disappeared I found the current music to be fine too--right up until the 90s ended, and the music began to sound too strident, too incoherent, and yes, too loud. Now everyone looks too young to me, doctors, plumbers, mailmen, everyone, and when I see old farts on TV gabbing on and on about the Vietnam war, it's a shock to realize they are in fact my age. The entertainers like Cher and Robert Redford are old farts too, and the new ones on the magazine covers are completely unrecognizable. People talk about movies I've not only not seen, but never even heard of, when did that happen? When I tell the kids an old old joke, they laugh instead of groan, because it's not old to them. When I watch TV, I spend an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out where I've seen that actor before, only to find out it's the son or daughter of the actor I remember. And god knows my body is wearing out, I've only to listen to the cacophony of my knees to know that.

Anyway, as I reflect on all of this, I wonder if it wouldn't be the best to accept, even embrace my ever-growing decrepitude. Go ahead and wear cotton housedresses and ankle socks. Give up makeup, haircolor, and tweezing my bristles. Keep playing LPs, go back to Windows 3.1, put cash in little envelopes for groceries, clip coupons.

Wait a minute...would I have to vote Republican?

Never mind.

Discouraged

Saw the ortho doc today. He said there was a little healing occurring on the broken ankle in one (small) spot, put on a new cast and said "4 weeks more" minimum. It is 25 days today since I broke it. I went home, and 4 hours later I'm back at the doctor's, unable to bend my leg at the knee without tourniqueting my leg. Sheer pain! I said, get this thing off, no more casts, I can't bear it for 4 more weeks, and he said, it's either a cast or find another doctor. So I got another cast, AND my x-rays to take to another doctor tomorrow. How dare I object to his medical wisdom? I need a doctor who will work with me on this, keep me from going berserk, and if it isn't healing, go for the surgery. I already didn't like this guy, and he wouldn't even discuss a walking boot, air cast, or anything but a damned fiberglass cast that can't be removed, gotten wet, or balanced on.

Raven got her splint off, and is still a little gimpy, but running and playing all the same. She goes tomorrow for her first trip to the groomer, so hopefully she will smell better for a few days at least. It would help a lot if, when she squats to piddle, she didn't subsequently SIT in the puddle. I mean, isn't that a little dumb? The, ah, aura surrounding her is particularly noticeable when she is draped over the shoulder while navigating stairs.

I got my MacBook back today from repair; somehow one of the hinges broke, and it is all of 3 months old. They were amazingly fast, received and shipped it out the same day, can't beat that. It was a warranty repair; when I Googled "Macbook broken hinge" I got 33,400 hits. I thought from the beginning that the hinges were a little creaky, and I wasn't sure how far I could tip the screen back, because it felt like I was forcing it. Alls betta now!

While I am immobile for so much of the time I am doing a lot of reading and a lot of crossword puzzles. I have never been able to use those books of puzzles because I fall to the temptation to look up the answer when I get stuck. Now I download daily puzzles to my Palm Pilot and can get a hint of a single letter or a single word, if I absolutely have no idea (I am REALLY bad at geography questions). And when I get it totally solved, the screen says "congrats!" It's pretty lame when you have to get your kudos from a inanimate object.

We Match!

I never realized that casts were contagious. Little Raven got in the way when the guys were unloading hay into the barn, and got a 50 pound bale dropped on her. We rushed to the vet (on a Sunday, of course!) and the xray didn't show a break, but in puppies, with all the growth plates in the radiogram, it is hard to tell. So, splint and wait for a week; and meanwhile she can no longer sneak up on the cats. Hearing her walk in the kitchen from downstairs sounds like the sound effects from a horror movie, SCRRRape, thud, SCRRRape, thud. Now she has to be carried outside AND inside, and she has gained 10 lbs since she was 8 weeks old, she now weighs 29 pounds, at not-quite-12 weeks old. Needless to say, I'm not the one doing the carrying. My ortho doc says, no signs of healing, come back in two more weeks, and I am discouraged to say the least. The only saving grace is that I don't have to work anymore. But this surely isn't what I had in mind for me OR the puppy when I retired.

Right now there are other sound effects; there are 5 guys on the roof doing a lot of pounding, as they replace the roof. They do not have complimentary things to say about the last roofing effort, but then, have you ever known a workman to say, "Hey, those last guys did a heckofa job, we really can't do anything better"? No of course not. Anyway, after we get a few good rains and verify that the damn dining room ceiling isn't leaking, they will come back and put up new drywall on the ceiling and re-plaster. Hopefully it will match, but even if not, it will be a big improvement over the hole and brown stains:



Sigh. We've been in this house 25+ years, so I guess you have to expect some fairly major upkeep along the way, but it feels like it's a big hole into which we throw money. Worst of all right now, is that with me laid up, the cleaning is not getting done, but I just look the other way and promise to do a real job of spring cleaning on it once I am mobile again. I've never enjoyed the role of nag, and the kids and N have enough to do as it is. My main interest right now is getting OUT! Just a little cabin feverish, you know.

The patient is resting quietly

Can you see the little black nose on the far left? That's the puppy, and the reason Beans looks like she's possessed. They'll work it out.

Having an 11 week old pup who can't go down stairs without being carried, a split level house, and a broken ankle is not combination I'd wish on my worst enemy. Plus, I have cabin fever big time, since the only time I've been out of the house since I broke it on the 15th was yesterday, to the ortho dr. I came home with a new, tighter cast, and the news that there is no sign of healing. I bet that I'll go through weeks of gimping around on this, and THEN the dr. will decide to do surgery, thus ensuring I am laid up for twice as long.





Mega rain for this area, flood watches out. And us with a leaky roof! The repair will start in 2 weeks or so; meanwhile it's...........

Need a carpet cleaner

The puppy is a lot of fun, don't get me wrong. But although she seems to feel OK, it is also true that in the poop department, she has no equal. We took her to the vet for anti-diarrheal meds, and then in the end taking her back for the vet to keep for two nights and give her anti-spasmodics, sedative, and so on, to get on top of this thing. She is home now, and seems to be much improved, so we are back to trying the housebreaking game again. I guess it is a foregone conclusion that all the carpets will eventually have to be cleaned. Meanwhile, we make daily use of the SpotBot we got a year or so ago (mainly to clean up cat barf stains). It works great, too great in some cases, leaving a clear light area amid a more dingy background. Isn't pet ownership fun?

In a related topic, I've been taking a bunch of photos, not surprisingly. What was surprising was that among our many many cameras, 35mm, 110 and

I stopped right there to get ready to go out for an appointment.

I started downstairs to get my purse and coat.

I fell on the stairs and broke my ankle.

it is now evening on the 15th and I am in bed with my leg in a cast propped on pillows. I broke this same ankle 10+ years ago, just the tip of my fibula, but after 5 months it hadn't healed, and I had surgery to have two screws inserted to hold the fibula in place. The doc today told me good news, the old break is well healed and the screws look fine; the bad news is there is a spiral fracture of the fibula just above the screws. He sent me to an ortho doc, who said he was fairly sure I wouldn't need surgery for this break, but I'm to come back in a week so he can xray it again. I feel really down, since I am diabetic my bones are slow to heal, and I remember the sheer misery being one-legged caused me in the past. No walking the dog for me, just as she gets to where she frolics instead of gluing herself to my leg. I have to ask for help at every step, can't drive (right ankle) and our house being two stories means I am either up or down, and whatever I want will be on the other floor.

Feeling down doesn't begin to cover it.

Puppy Mom

Above is the photo I took a few minutes ago. There are inherent problems with photographing a solid black dog. They may be clearly defined in the viewfinder, but simply put, they don't reflect as much light as, say, a tan dog. In my film camera, I can use the backlight compensation (+2 for instance), but my simplistic digital camera doesn't. So as I get my film processed, I ask for a CD, and from that I'll uplaod a better pic.

Getting a new puppy is more work than I remember from 20+ years ago. The whining at night, the housebreaking accidents, the necessity to put everything UP above nose height (which will get higher and higher as she grows!), it's all a constant struggle. Garbage cans. Kleenex. Shoes. Candy wrappers. The only saving grace is knowing that, unlike babies, puppies grow up really fast, and in 6 months the worst will be over. I shall endure.

As for the cats, the youngest one has hidden in a back bedroom for the last week, but the others are getting pretty blase about the pup. Mind, they too recognize the value of getting up high. Fortunately, she is unable to use stairs, so they can go up when she's down, and vice versa.

We named her Raven. She's 8 weeks old today, and weighs 18 pounds.

On the mend

Slowly recovering the ability to breathe through my nose, but still in bed to write this. More snow today, but mid-week it is supposed to warm up into the 40s. This is good news because Friday we drive to the Cleveland area to pick up the new puppy! There will be pictures posted, not only of the puppy, but of 5 very ticked-off cats. This should, at least, have the upside of distracting them from the aquarium, where new fish are darting and air is bubbling, and the fish won't swim near the front of the aquarium for fear of attack.

The hub and son made a run to the store yesterday for orange juice, and came home with candy, cookies and cake as well, bless them. My appetite has been nil with the cold, for everything except sweets. Being diabetic, I am careful of amounts I eat, but I can't eat nothing either.

In addition to general web surfing, I have been ebaying quite a bit. I was on ebay back when I had to explain to people what it was. Too bad I didn't invest in it too. Anyway. I've had good fun with it, getting everything from clothes to Christmas trees. Currently I'm interested in old cameras. We have several that were bought new back in the 50s to the 70s, and recently we sorted through them all in the process of re-arranging furniture. Somehow, I can't get into the whole digital scene, the comparable pixel-to-film comparison is generally thought to be 12 Mpix = 35mm at 100 ASA, and do you know what a 12 Mpix camera costs? Some sources say it is actually more like 24 Mpix, if you want to make a significant enlargement. Plus, I like photos I can hold in my hand, or frame, or fill an album, and the cost of printing digital photos is absurd. And too, I think of archival properties. How can a digital photo be preserved in a format that will be usable in, say, 50 years? CDs don't last more than 20 or so, I've been told, even if the hardware and software to read them is still around. The same goes for flash cards, hard drives, etc. Remember 5 1/4" floppies? I have family photos as cabinet cards dating back to post civil war times, taken in the Matthew Brady studio in D.C. But yet the film part of photography is taking it on the chin. It is exceedingly hard to find film in 110, 16 mm, 120 mm or most polaroid formats, let alone someone willing to process them. I'm sorry we did away with our home darkroom, at the time I had a really great one available at work (for doing electron microscopy), but now some of that technology has been subverted to the digital format too, although believe me, the film used in EMs, at an ASA of around 8 and magnifications of 100,000 x, make the digital cameras on the scopes cost in the hundreds of thousands, often equal to the cost of the scope itself. And the digital files are, of course, gigantic. Anyway, no darkroom here anymore, although I think the Vo Tech still offers classes in B&W photog. I took photo classes in San Fran where the emphasis was photography as art; here at the university I took photojournalism classes, which is an entirely different kind of slant on photos. The funny thing about any kind of photograph is, if you show someone a really good bunch of pictures, the almost universal reaction is to say, wow, you must have a good camera. And not that you yourself had any influence on the subject, composition, exposure, depth of field, etc. Just that you had 'a good camera'. The best camera in the world, with every shot technically correct, won't equal having a 'good eye'. Neither will Photoshop.

Well, just writing this has tired me out, so I'll give up for now. Hope everyone is keeping warm!

sick, sicker, sickest

Having a cold/the flu is the pits. Between the sore throat, the hoarness, the drips, the aches, you get the picture....

I haven't had so much as a sniffle in years.

Outside it is 20 and snowing, with wind gusting to 30 mph. Thank gods I don't have to work, or even go out, except the Miata is supposed to go to the shop on Friday, which will only happen if we get the sunshine plow through here sometime soon (not likely). I think I caught the cold at the grocery store, but we bought enough for two full weeks of cooking, so I can hibernate as needed.

Signing off for now....